Apple Is Building A Cheaper iPhone 4 (Report)

This makes a whole lot of sense. As the iPhone 5 comes out, the iPhone 4 is going to get cheaper anyway so Apple may as well take advantage of that. And by now most of the capital costs of building the iPhone 4 are almost certainly covered so Apple can go for volume and cost.

And most crucially, there is a huge market for lower-priced smartphone in emerging (and even developed) countries that Apple hasn't tapped that much but where companies like RIM and Nokia are crushing it. This is important not just because there's money (and torrid growth) there but because smartphones are platforms and Apple is in a global race with Google to build the biggest platform, so grabbing marketshare really matters.